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In a striking departure from the ideological preferences of the post-Vietnam Democratic Party, President Barack Obama has made overseas arms sales a pillar of U.S. foreign policy. The President and his advisors apparently have decided that well-armed allies are the next best thing to U.S. "boots on the ground" when it comes to advancing America's global security interests.

A case in point was the Christmas Eve disclosure that the administration would sell $30 billion in fighter jets, munitions, spare parts and support services to the kingdom of Saudi Arabia. In the past, some Democrats in Congress might have questioned the propriety of selling high-tech weapons to a government noted for its conservative social policies. But administration officials described the deal as a pragmatic solution to regional security needs, one that would provide the world's preeminent oil producer with the means to deter Iranian aggression without compromising Israel's defense. Having already approved a $60 billion package of arms sales with the kingdom -- of which the fighter deal is only one part -- Congress is sure to accept White House reasoning.

It doesn't hurt that such sales create tens of thousands of jobs in the U.S. Boeing assembles the F-15 fighters at the center of the deal in Missouri, and General Electric will build the engines in Ohio. Both are swing states whose electoral-college votes could determine the outcome of the 2012 presidential race. Many additional jobs will be created at the sprawling Raytheon missile complex in Arizona, a state already poised to benefit from an earlier Saudi buy of 36 Boeing Apache tank-killer helicopters. Raytheon's radar facility in Massachusetts should also be a big beneficiary.

What the president and his advisors have figured out is that, unlike sending troops to fight overseas, there is almost no downside to sending weapons. They allow partners such as Saudi Arabia to meet more of their own security needs indigenously rather than relying on an overstretched U.S. military, and they stimulate economic activity in America’s industrial heartland at a time when well-paying, unionized manufacturing jobs are hard to come by. So the Obama Administration has abandoned any pretense of limiting overseas arms sales, and embraced the reality that America is likely to remain the world's biggest weapons merchant for many years to come.

The change of heart was signaled only months after Obama took office, when incoming Pentagon policy chief Michelle Flournoy dismissed the notion that the new administration would have an "arms sale policy," describing the U.S. approach instead as a "commitment to build partner capacity and doing that on a strategic basis that takes a requirements-based approach." In effect, Flournoy set aside ideology in favor of a technocratic framework for assessing the military needs of overseas friends and allies.

This shift has proven to be a good fit for an administration that inherited two unpopular wars, massive budget deficits, and a weak economy. Not only do arms sales make it easier to draw down overseas forces while bolstering the nation's trade balance, but they undermine Republican rhetoric about Obama being soft on national security. When a president sustains high rates of military spending, takes out the world's most wanted terrorist, and sells the latest military technology to friends around the globe, it's difficult for his political opponents to explain how they could have been any harder on America's enemies.